ALS TDI's Early Years: Founding the First Nonprofit Biotech

In 1999, Stephen Heywood, who was 29 years old at the time, was diagnosed with ALS. His family was devastated when they learned that there were no treatments that could slow or stop his disease. His brother Jamie decided that he had to do something about it, founding the organization that would eventually become ALS TDI – the world’s first nonprofit biotech – in the basement of his parents’ Newton, MA home.

The first hire Jamie made as he worked to get this new organization off the ground was Rob Bonazoli. In those days, Rob was responsible for, in his words, “everything non-scientific.”  Part of this included building the team that would carry out Jamie’s lofty research goals.

Many of the people he helped recruit at that time are still with the organization twenty-five years later. Two of those early employees were Ken Thompson, now ALS TDI’s Vice President of Facility Operations, and Fernando Vieira, our CEO and Chief Scientific Officer.

Today, on Endpoints, we’re joined by Rob – as well as Ken and Fernando – to talk about what it’s been like to see ALS TDI grow from its humble beginnings to one of the world’s leading ALS research institutions.

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